


you draw stars around my scars

by EvancexLizzie



Series: one single thread of gold tied me to you - ushisaku week [3]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Canon Compliant, Character Study, Childhood Memories, Day 4, Established Relationship, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Obsessive Behavior, Post-Time Skip, Sakusa Kiyoomi-centric, Ushisaku Week, also happy left-handed day !, the life of sakusa kiyoomi: a fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-13
Updated: 2020-08-13
Packaged: 2021-03-06 06:34:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,181
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25878994
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EvancexLizzie/pseuds/EvancexLizzie
Summary: Ushisaku Week - day 4 (free day)Sakusa Kiyoomi lays awake at night, wondering what it feels like to be passionate. To genuinely enjoy something, to yearn for progress and success out of pure indulgence, to still be capable of focusing on more important matters when the time comes. He ponders how satisfaction comes in different shapes, how it transforms into happiness and excitation and enlightens the others’ faces while it only brings him relief.If passion is about control and enjoyment, a thing that barges in your life to bring you joy for an indefinite amount of time, then obsession is about relentlessness and intrusion, a thing that enslaves your mind and subjugates your thoughts, bends your will and controls your life; and when it finally leaves your mind, you’re only met with a brief feeling of alleviation.Kiyoomi wonders if he’ll ever experience joy, the pure and incandescent joy he sometimes witnesses on others’ faces, an unknown feeling he somehow started longing for.
Relationships: Sakusa Kiyoomi/Ushijima Wakatoshi
Series: one single thread of gold tied me to you - ushisaku week [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1873648
Comments: 4
Kudos: 49
Collections: UshiSakuWeek 2020





	you draw stars around my scars

**Author's Note:**

> happy free day everyone !! happy birthday ushijima wakatoshi !! happy international left-handed day !!
> 
> for today's prompt ive decided to dive into smth very personal. 
> 
> hope you'll like it !!

_ Do you consider it a gift or a curse?  _

The question has been lying unanswered in his head for as long as he can remember, crippling his mind like filth cripples his skin: itchy, strident, disturbing. Barely tolerable.

A lifetime of struggles and fears, leaving his body a barren land and his mind an overthinking mess; leaving him with no one to trust, and certainly not himself.

It’s a question that follows him everywhere, a demon lurking in the corner, a thought that leaves him restless and aching at night. He’s heard it once, thrown casually into the hallway by a volleyball comrade. Or maybe it was just his mind playing tricks because children don’t ask that kind of question, children are just jealous and bored and don’t want to play with someone who’s gotten better than them at a sport they’ve been playing for much longer.

And it’s always like this, always has been and always will be. Sakusa carries an invisible burden, weighing on his shoulders and pressing down in his chest, like shackles on his ankles, all disguised as effortless talent and genuine interest.

The thing is, Kiyoomi’s never cared enough to unfold the truth, bare and wicked. He’s spent a lifetime not minding other people’s opinions, a childhood of quietness, and lonely contentment. They wouldn’t understand anyway. It’s already hard enough for him to grasp. The invading thoughts that get stuck in his head and don’t leave until they’ve been satisfied, until he’s been willing to sacrifice his undivided attention on the altar of his obsession, until it’s thoroughly done, finished, over and he can finally breathe and sleep as he frees himself from his imaginary abductors. 

Sakusa Kiyoomi lays awake at night, wondering what it feels like to be passionate. To genuinely enjoy something, to yearn for progress and success out of pure indulgence, to still be capable of focusing on more important matters when the time comes. He ponders how satisfaction comes in different shapes, how it transforms into happiness and excitation and enlightens the others’ faces while it only brings him  _ relief. _

If  _ passion _ is about control and enjoyment, a thing that barges in your life to bring you joy for an indefinite amount of time, then  _ obsession _ is about relentlessness and intrusion, a thing that enslaves your mind and subjugates your thoughts, bends your will and controls your life; and when it finally leaves your mind, you’re only met with a brief feeling of alleviation.

Kiyoomi wonders if he’ll ever experience joy, the pure and incandescent joy he sometimes witnesses on others’ faces, an unknown feeling he somehow started longing for. 

###

_ A gift, certainly. _

It’s late when he comes back from volleyball training. He’s spent the last two hours doing the wall drill when everyone had already left, his mind focused on perfecting his wicked spin, and had to call it a day when the middle school’s monitor stopped by the gymnasium and ordered him to go home. On his way back from school, all he thinks about is how the volleyball shifts at the contact of his palm, the shape of his spike and the satisfying sound when it hits the wall.

When he gets home, he finds a plate of food waiting for him and no human around. Even though he’s been craving for food since he left the compound, he goes straight to the bathroom and gets rid of his clothes immediately, putting them directly into the laundry basket. His skin’s been itching lately, a layer of dirt covering his body and sulling his mind, preventing him from concentrating at school. The late discovery that the world is polluted and unkempt.

This night again, he scrubs the invisible filth until his skin is left crimson and aching. It hurts, but it doesn’t itch anymore.

He eats quickly, spends a great deal of time hand-washing his dishes while the dishwasher is left unused right next to him, and goes back to his room. On his way to his bed, he takes a quick look at the finished puzzle of one thousand pieces he’s managed to finish a week before. He remembers the urge he’d felt when he’d started it, forgetting to eat and sleep until the piece was completed.

There are five other puzzles waiting for him. Birthday gifts from a distant family who had heard that he liked puzzles. 

Kiyoomi goes straight to bed, opens his smartphone, and starts watching videos of volleyball pro players, only turning off his phone hours later, when slumber has come to take him away. His Youtube history has been filled with volleyball videos and cleaning tips for days. 

He doesn’t realize yet what he’s thrown himself into. He doesn’t grab yet the concept of a bottomless pit, an obsession that will never leave because there’s no completion, no intense feeling of freedom and relief. Neither volleyball nor cleaning are about _ release,  _ the most satisfying sensation he’s come across until now. He’s trapped with endless challenges and infinite improvement, doomed to never feel fulfilled ever again.  __

The other puzzles lay there, unopened and doomed to be stocked in the nearest cupboard. 

_ Or maybe a curse. _

###

_ Is it love or obsession? _

_ Certainly, obsession _ .

At first, Kiyoomi thinks he’s simply obsessed. He comes home from the tournament, discards his bag in a corner of his bedroom, and immediately starts searching for videos about left-handed players. The day after, he insists on working on service receiving and doesn’t leave until his forearms are crimson and aching. A mirror as to what his body has become over the years.

Over the months, his bedroom has been transformed into a hospital stockroom. What had once held his puzzles now shelters an impressive stock of hand-sanitizer, surgical masks, gloves, detergent, tissues, and adhesive brushes. His life has become crippled by his latent fear of germs, the consequence of his endless obsession for cleaning. Nothing's ever immaculate enough, no one's ever hygienic enough. But he's learned to live with it, and it's fine, he tells himself, it’s fine because one day it will go away. Because he’s a foolish teenager who still hasn’t realized there’s no bottom line.

And his infatuation for the southpaw will go away soon enough. He’s simply going to practice until he can beat him in the next tournament and it will be over. He doesn’t read anything more into that obsession that makes him yearn for encounters, for exchanges, for touches with a stranger. 

It’s not as if he could get passionate about anything, let alone anyone to begin with.

  
  


But it doesn’t go away. 

Kiyoomi’s never been obsessed with a person, so he doesn’t know how to handle it. He takes the most of their encounters, watching with close attention each of Wakatoshi’s games whenever he can, or not-so-subtlely stalking him behind a pillar to learn more about his cleaning routine. 

Progressively, they start talking, becoming familiar with the other. They sit on the same benches, stroll around the gymnasium to buy the same shirts, share the brands of their favorite cleaning products. They go home and still send each other videos of their favorite volleyball highlights and news about their preferred players.

Wakatoshi is a quiet and composed person. He’s passionate about volleyball, but Kiyoomi doesn’t find traces of the joy he’s been so used to see into the other’s eyes when they’re enjoying their passions. Wakatoshi is determined and fierce and strong-willed and while he certainly enjoys volleyball more than most of the kids of their age, he just doesn’t show it. And Kiyoomi understands for the first time that happiness isn’t necessarily a sentiment that must be shown to the world. It can be a nice, quiet feeling that melts inside your chest and warms your insides, which makes your lips twitch upwards and your eyes crease in fondness.

A feeling Kiyoomi has become quite acquainted with lately, more than he’s willing to admit.

And before he can put words on it, before he can classify his feelings and search for a rational meaning, Wakatoshi is asking with all the carefulness in the world if he can hold Kiyoomi’s barren hands. Asking if he can kiss his pretty lips. Asking if he can unravel his burning body.

Kiyoomi never says no. He wishes he knew how to say ‘no’ to a man so willing and considerate, he wishes he knew how his obsession for this man has led him to defy every rule he’s ever set and how he’s now supposed to live a life of contradictions, refusing to bear soil on his own body but willingly welcoming his, no question asked. 

He wonders if there’s a bottom line for this one and a new undesirable feeling arises in his chest, constricting his lungs and suffocating his mind: fear. Crippling, horrendous fear that one day he would wake up and toss Wakatoshi away as he’s tossed those puzzles back into his cupboard. 

The mere idea of not having Wakatoshi into his life anymore is unbearable, so unbearable they haven’t even thought of questioning a long-distance relationship before quietly agreeing on it. Over time, Wakatoshi became an unwavering part of life, anchored to such an extent that Kiyoomi barely remembers what his life resembled before. 

He lets Wakatoshi massage his hands and touch his clothes. He lets Wakatoshi into his space, his home, his heart. Kiyoomi has nowhere to hide anymore, and when Wakatoshi looks at him with reverence, mesmerizing olive orbs yielding in adoration, he feels exposed.

Wakatoshi takes and takes and takes, and Kiyoomi gives everything he has to offer, displaying himself on an altar and waiting for the pleasurable sacrifice. 

_ Or maybe, it’s just love _ .

It takes time to learn the difference, as subtle as it is. 

The strong infatuation that inhabits his body and never leaves him, the profound ache at night when he isn’t there, the profound satisfaction of finding his way back to him in the midst of his yearning, the now-familiar feeling of contentment and bliss when he sees him, speaks to him, touches him, kisses him, makes love with him.

Obsession has never provided such satisfying feelings, and when he’s left with his thoughts as sole companions, everything blurs and panics not recognizing this unknown feeling that has taken over his life, which seems as uncontrollable but still brings tremendous amounts of happiness.

Whatever it is, it never goes away. 

###

They’re lying in a bed inside his little apartment in Tokyo, twisted naked in bedsheets. It’s their first week together in a while. Sakusa nailed his university exams for the second year in a row and Wakatoshi got back from Rio de Janeiro the night before, naturally finding his way back to Kyioomi’s lips and arms. 

Half-awake and still nicely sore from their night, Kiyoomi turns his head to contemplate the beautiful man that managed to slip into his heart and under his skin years ago, only to find him looking back, adoration visible in his eyes. Sakusa’s insides pleasantly twist. But it’s always pleasant, when Wakatoshi is around; more manageable and enjoyable, almost  _ peaceful _ .

Kiyoomi’s glare flickers toward Wakatoshi’s left-hand resting between them. He gently grabs it with his own hand, reverentially caressing the calloused skin and studying the strengthened fingers with deference. 

A hand that has caused the despair of many over the years. The memories of his first encounter still lays burning and raw into Kiyoomi’s mind.

"Do you consider it a gift or a curse?"

Wakatoshi slightly raises an eyebrow at the unexpected question, the first words pronounced that shatter the morning silence. The answer doesn’t come immediately and Wakatoshi’s left-hand unconsciously flutters, fingers gripping Sakusa’s ones with gentleness.

"Today, I consider it a gift.” He chooses each word carefully, thoroughly turning the question in his mind. “But even if I’ve always tried to see it as a gift, it wasn’t easy growing-up.”

"And what was it like, growing up left-handed?” Kiyoomi asks, feeling the urge to know, to understand, to compare.

"I don’t think it's different from being right-handed for the most part." Ushijima starts slowly. "But people around me did make it a problem. Before they got a divorce, I could hear my parents fighting over it. I also met several home teachers during my elementary school who didn’t agree and forced me to write with my right hand.” 

He takes a short pause, brushing Kiyoomi’s skin with reverence, certainly reminiscing unpleasant memories. 

"Does it mean you can write with both hands?" 

It’s always amazed Kiyoomi, how someone as meticulous and composed as Wakatoshi could have such horrendous writing. He’s seen him write, take his time with each character, and the result would still be the one of a middle-schooler. 

"Yes. I kept practicing in secret with my left-hand to please my dad.” Knowing Wakatoshi, Kiyoomi doubts his parents have ever learned the treatment he was receiving at school. “Also, my mother has always insisted that I use my right hand to hold my baguettes when we eat together. So don’t be surprised when you meet her, if we happen to have dinner together."

_ When you meet her _ . The thought makes his cheeks burn and his heart flutter, leaving him aching for more. 

“So, you’ve always been this accommodating.” Kiyoomi answers, a veiled smile appearing on his lips. 

Kiyoomi adores Wakatoshi for many reasons, so many reasons it would be difficult for him to enumerate them. But he’s always itched for the  _ considerate _ Wakatoshi, his carefulness, and his devotion toward others and in particular toward him. The great lengths he’s accepted to cross so Kiyoomi could live each day feeling a little more at peace with his surroundings.

Wakatoshi is a man who should be worshipped for his unselfishness and Kiyoomi doesn’t mind spending the rest of his life offering himself on the shrine of their mutual allegiance.

“I don’t see it this way.” Wakatoshi responds after a time. “You simply grow up realizing the world was made for right-handed people, and it becomes a matter of habits. Those are little things, there’s no need to complain about it.”

“I want to hear it.” Kiyoomi asks, a mere whisper. “I want to hear you complain, at least once.” 

“... You want to hear me complain about the casual bothers of being left-handed?” Wakatoshi repeats with concealed amusement, a frown on his face.

Kiyoomi nods, so Wakatoshi tells him. He tells him about the fact that practically none of his comrades knew scissors for left-handed people were a thing, and that he stopped asking for some during middle school, simply learning to use the “normal” ones and getting scolded for the poor manual work resulting from it. He explains in detail how sewing machines are made for right-handed people and why he would always get stung by the needles, pinning them in the wrong way and ending with blood on the clothe and another scolding from his grandmother this time. 

Those are silly stories, certainly not worthy of any complaint. Yet, Kiyoomi listens with folds as Wakatoshi unfolds fragments of his childhood, raw and authentic. 

“...So, even after everything you’ve told me,” Kiyoomi says, after Wakatoshing is done sharing, “you still consider it a gift.” And he can’t help but feel dubious about it. The weight of his own curse weighing on his shoulders, his mutilated hands a living proof.

“It helped me getting to where I am today, as a volleyball player.” Wakatoshi holds his breath for a second, his gaze transfixed into Kiyoomi’s one. “You noticed me, because of it. Knowing that, how could I not consider it a gift?”

Kiyoomi doesn’t know what to say. Every answer seems small, childish, insignificant compared to what Wakatoshi has just laid bare in front of him. His heart drums loudly in his chest, so loud it resonates to his ears, so loud he’s certain Wakatoshi can hear it.

Instead of answering, Kiyoomi chooses to close the small gap between them, grabbing Wakatoshi’s neck to urge him closer, and their lips clash expectantly, hungrily devouring each other. The kiss is hot and messy, Kiyoomi pouring all his ardor and yearning while Wakatoshi lasciviously licks into his mouth. His fingers start roaming over Kiyoomi’s naked abs, caressing the reddened skin with adoration. Their burning desire awakens rapidly and their movements intensify, adventurous hands trailing beneath. 

As Wakatoshi ravishes his body, Kiyoomi’s barely able to hold coherent thoughts. With Wakatoshi, he’s learned to forget about bacterias or volleyball moves, learned to think of nothing else but the feeling of skin against skin and the urge for more, always more, until he’s left empty and sore and exhausted, until he’s left contented and pleasured beyond imagination. 

They slumber back into sleep shortly after, baking in the aftermath of their lovemaking. Kiyoomi’s hand has gone back to holding Wakatoshi’s. 

He never wants to let go.

### 

On Sunday mornings, Kiyoomi usually waters the plants while Wakatoshi makes breakfast for both of them. Today is no exception.

Holding the watering can, he sprays each species growing on their balcony with all the care in the world. It’s become less of a balcony and more of a forest over time, making it almost impossible for them to use the space for other purposes, but Kiyoomi doesn’t care as long as Wakatoshi is happy, as long as he can see this stoic face crackle into a mesmerizing thin smile and his eyes crease with fondness. 

Kiyoomi’s found a liking in taking care of their progenies as it appeases his mind and relaxes his body. When they moved together in that apartment last year, Wakatoshi had considered not buying any plants or bringing those from his ancient place. After all, plants are living organisms producing their own sorts of germs, and Kiyoomi hates germs, and Wakatoshi could never favor something over Kiyoomi’s comfort. 

But the apartment felt empty and Wakatoshi found himself devoid of any purpose, because Wakatoshi truly loved taking care of his plants, because Wakatoshi found joy in nurturing them and watching them grow, because Wakatoshi is a man who yearns for the flowering of what surrounds him. And Kiyoomi loved watching him tending to his plants’ needs as if they were his own children, loved how those calloused fingers that either brushed his skin with adoration or gripped his hips with fervor were acting so delicate around the greenish leaves.

It was utterly selfish to keep those miracle hands to himself, Kiyoomi realized on a night where Wakatoshi was massaging his fingers and applying cream on his skin, caressing it with a devotion akin to the deity. So the morning after, he took advantage of Wakatoshi’s absence to go buy some plants, overcoming his initial disgust. And, as he didn’t know which ones Wakatoshi liked, and didn’t consider where all those could fit yet, he had bought far too many for his own good and had to call Miya to help him bring everything back to their apartment. 

Miya had called him a simp. Kiyoomi had had to look up the meaning of the word on the internet. He had spent the next several hours denying it while arranging the plants, realizing that, yeah, he’d definitely bought far too many of them. Thankfully, Wakatoshi’s bewildered expression when he’d gotten back later on the day had been worth all the work. Then, his eyes had creased in amusement, and before Kiyoomi could ask what was so funny, eyebrows furrowed in confusion, he’d crossed the distance between them and carefully brushed his cheek, whipping off some dirt that had managed to makes his way onto Kiyoomi’s skin without him noticing.

It had taken Kiyoomi by surprise, but before his mind could come to the frightening realization that his body was sullied and in a need of another disinfection, Wakatoshi had kissed the breath out of his lungs, rendering him weak and dizzy, before guiding him to the shower. Kiyoomi can still hear the murmurs pronounced against his wet skin, the solemn  _ thank you  _ whispered against his hair, the deified  _ i love you _ sung between his thighs, the ardor on a tongue revering his body and sanctifying his moans.

For the following days, Kiyoomi had carefully watched Wakatoshi move around his plants, taking a reluctant interest in it while reverently listening to Wakatoshi’s lectures on which amount of sun and water each plant needed. In the end, Wakatoshi’s passion for those greenish things had gotten the better of him. 

The sound of footsteps coming from behind gets Kiyoomi out of his thoughts, and before he can turn around, a large frame wraps around him, broad shoulders enveloping his body and bare skin warming his muscles. It will always amuse him, the fact that even if they are the same size - leaving out the unfortunate 0.4cm difference - Wakatoshi weighs ten kilos more than him, ten kilos of pure muscles that Kiyoomi can perfectly feel pressed against his back. 

Wakatoshi likes walking around the house half-naked. He says the weather’s too hot for him, but Kiyoomi can’t remember the number of times he got distracted by the sight, gaze trailing from his book and lingering on those carved abs and broad, thick arms, only to have Wakatoshi look at him seconds after and ask him with that infernal fake genuine tone  _ “is there something wrong?”.  _ The bastard was totally doing it on purpose, and it was beyond infuriating.

Still, Kiyoomi never told him to put a shirt on.

“Breakfast is ready.” Wakatoshi says. He feels his breath tickling his neck as sweet lips come to leave a peck at the crook of his neck. 

“You know that the neighbors can see you, right?” Kiyoomi sternly answers. Wakatoshi’s hand gently comes to lay against Kiyoomi’s, calloused fingers wrapping around both his and the watering can. The mere touch sends waves of electricity through Kiyoomi’s body.

Even after all those years, Wakatoshi’s mere touch still flusters Kiyoomi to no end. He can still remember his heart beating loudly in his chest the first time Wakatoshi’s fingers had wrapped around his, strong yet hesitant. Today, it still makes his body tremble in fervency.

After all those years, it still hasn’t gone away.

“Hm. Do you mind?” Wakatoshi genuinely asks, even if he already knows the answer. 

“Not really.” Kiyoomi responds casually. “They can look all they want but at the end of the day, I know it’s all mine.”

Wakatoshi’s chest trembles, the rumble of a laugh. He only answers by adoringly kissing Kiyoomi’s temple. 

After attending to their plant duties, they head back inside of the apartment. Kiyoomi watches Wakatoshi’s large frame, slowing down on his tracks on his way to the kitchen. He looks around the place they own together, at the furniture they assembled together, at the walls they painted together, at the trophies they brought home together.

Satisfaction is a weird sentiment that unfolds in a lot of different ways, and Kiyoomi thinks he’s experienced many of them over the years. It used to be a primal urge, something he desperately thrived for in order to free himself, something he could only feel when it was over, when it was done, when he couldn’t care less about it afterward and pretend it hasn’t even existed.

It used to be only that and nothing more. But volleyball barged into his life. Volleyball brought him on the verge of that bottomless pit and asked him to jump and he did, and he never looked back. 

Wakatoshi appeared alongside not long after. He never left. Kiyoomi never asked him to.

It’s not over, it’s not done, but it still brings him endless happiness. Happiness,  _ the nice, quiet feeling that melts inside your chest and warms your insides, which makes your lips twitch upwards and your eyes crease in fondness. _

He still thrives for improvement and yearns for victory with the same craze. But it doesn’t leave him restless and frustrated anymore. It doesn’t leave him with a bittersweet taste on the back of his tongue and the heavyweight of loneliness on his shoulders. 

His gaze lingers for a moment on the right, where the ray of sunshine has managed to sneak its way between the curtains of their living room to illuminate the two national jerseys that are hung up on the wall, crimson and white baking in the sun.

His endless fall has brought him to the top of the world, where he can proudly stand alongside him. 

“Wakatoshi-kun.” The name rolls on his tongue before he can stop it, and Wakatoshi turns around, looking at Kiyoomi as the sun rises behind him, illuminating his frame as he was a divinity who’s just descended from Heavens.

Kiyoomi’s lips twitch upwards. After a few seconds, he decides to hold back his words. “Nothing.” He takes a few steps and interlaces their fingers together.

The man of his obsessions, and the man of his dreams. The man he loves, he adores, he worships. The subject of his fascination and the deity of his life. 

It used to be a curse. 

Now, he considers it a gift.

**Author's Note:**

> hope you enjoyed !! thank you for reading !!
> 
> i want to point out that, as a left-handed person, every struggle Wakatoshi talks abt in this fic comes from personal exp lmfao so once again happy left-handed day to my fellow southpaws !! 
> 
> kudos and comments are greatly appreciated as always, i'd love to hear your thoughts ;;
> 
> and my tw acc: Fate_Evance
> 
> see you tomorrow for day 5 (i will be late for this entry but well)


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